Arch Linux

bpeary

Member

Registered: 2012-08-25

Posts: 40

Intermittent failure to boot [solved]

After 5+ years with Arch, I started getting this message for about half my attempted boots, and the other times it boots normally:

The root device is not configured to be mounted read-write! It may be fsck'd again later.
Mounting '/dev/sda3' on real root
Mount: /new_root: unknown filesystem type 'swap'
You are now being dropped into an emergency shell

My Arch installation in this triple-boot system is indeed on /dev/sda3.  My swap partition is on /dev/sdb3

I'm booting from an independent grub on /dev/sda1.  Arch is called as follows:

menuentry    "ARCH" {
   set root=(hd0,3)
   linux /boot/vmlinuz-linux root=/dev/sda3 ro
   initrd /boot/initramfs-linux.img
   boot
}

My other two distro's, Mint and LMDE3, on /dev/sda5 and /dev/sda2, boot normally.

I've tried fsck-ing from another distro, with no improvement.

Any suggestions welcome.

Last edited by bpeary (2019-10-16 23:28:26)

loqs

Member

Registered: 2014-03-06

Posts: 17,413

Re: Intermittent failure to boot [solved]

https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/63984
Please use code tags not yellow text.

Last edited by 2ManyDogs (2019-10-15 22:18:01)

Pse

Member

Registered: 2008-03-15

Posts: 413

Re: Intermittent failure to boot [solved]

As loqs said, this is a known issue. You can resolve it by using UUIDs or LABELs instead:

root=UUID=your-root-UUID

bpeary

Member

Registered: 2012-08-25

Posts: 40

Re: Intermittent failure to boot [solved]

Thank you both for this helpful information.  I used to use UUID's, but switched back to disk and partition numbers because they're easier to keep straight in my head.

Quick question though:  are you talking about modifying the lines in my external grub.cfg, /etc/fstab within Arch, or both?

loqs

Member

Registered: 2014-03-06

Posts: 17,413

Re: Intermittent failure to boot [solved]

Both.  Changing grub will fix the initial mounting of the root filesystem.
The fstab would also need fixing if entries do not use persistent block naming.

bpeary

Member

Registered: 2012-08-25

Posts: 40

Re: Intermittent failure to boot [solved]

Done.  Thanks.

lord_rel

Member

Registered: 2007-04-04

Posts: 36

Re: Intermittent failure to boot [solved]

if you like the disk and partition numbers maybe using the labeling that is supported for most disks and partition would also help you remember what they do in a clearer way then numbers or uuid

just take a look at /dev/disk/by-* there are multiple ways to have a nicer address be-label and by-partlabel are nice when you want something legible and uuid when you absolutely need it to work and am sure its the right partition/disk

bpeary

Member

Registered: 2012-08-25

Posts: 40

Re: Intermittent failure to boot [solved]

Yes, that's what I did, as I named the partitions back when I set them up. 

Thanks again to everyone.